Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Mephistopheles, Raphael and Emperor and their involvment

I found this video and remembered, that I had similar thoughts regarding Mephistopheles. I know, there was a disscussion about the Emperors invovlments somewhere, but I never thought about Raphaels deeper involvment. But this does make sense imo.

Bullet-Points:

- Gortash and Durge come up with the plan. (book lore in game)
- Mephistopheles actually allowed them to steal the Crown of Karsus in hopes to jump in and use it to his advantage (what exactly is his plan? Getting the tadpoled souls, before tehy turn and become soulless?) - Mephistopheles is known to be pretty paranoid and Cania has a lot of magical traps. I always find it strange that some dudes just stroll in there and steal the most inferious artefact in Faerun
- Raphael wants to disrupt his fathers and Gortashs plans by making a deal with Vlaakith (Orpheus is bound by infernal chains and Raph has the Orphic Hammer) and having a weapon against teh Absolute) - not sure, if Orpheus was always in infernal chains in that prison or if Raphael approached Vlaakith later. He could just have gotten involved in case, it turned out to his advantage
- Gortash finds out about the Astral Prism and sends Empi and Nautiloid to retrieve it (book lore in game)
- Emperor tadpoled us after he found the Astral Prism to get helpers against the Absolute

Here is the video, who explains it better, than me (mushy brain today):




What do you all think? Is Mephsitopheles involvment too far fetched here? I think, it is telling, that he is in the background for a lot of stuff (Cazador/ritual, Crown, Raphaels dad) and I don't give Gortash and Durge enough credit for being able to actually break into his secret vaults to retrieve an artefact of this importance without him knowing.

The Youtuber mentions the different eyes from first mindflayer, who tadpoles us, and Empi. But that can be because the first cutscene was there unchanged since EA.

It doesn't make sense.
By the book lore Gortash knew that the prism disrupt ilithid powers. Yet he sends an ilithid which is only kept in check by elder brain mind control to get it.

Neither does the timing of the tadpoling. When did the emperor even abduct the party? Most of them were in Baldurs gate and you don't just fly into Baldurs Gate with a Nautiloid. Especially Gale could have blown up the ship on his own if it tried to openly abduct him.
And if they were abducted before, why weren't they tadpoled before the mission instead of after the raid when their support was needed most?

That Mephi simply allowed Gortash to take the crown also makes no sense. What would he possibly gain from that?

Agreed - why would Gortash send the Emperor to retrieve that Prism? My only theory is, that he knows, it could be bad for the plan, but not how.
This book lore is the ground for that theory: The Astral Prism Heist - but he at least knows, that the prism disrupts illithid powers, so sending an illithid force was a big gamble.

Mephistopheles would have crushed Gortash and Durge for entering Cania and trying to steal the Crown. No way, they could have left with it without him wishing for them to leave. It made me think, if there was more planned with Mephistopheles and then scratched last minute.
I've read up on hell lore a bit, since I play DnD for 20 years, but never had a plot involving the hells and thus wasn't that versed. But according to the lore, Mephisto always is up for magical experminets and Cania is riddled with magical traps. So I can totally see him wanting to see, what can be achieved with the Crown and intervening if he thinks, he can something out of it.

It's possible that Gortash might have thought that the Moonrise alterations to the tadpole might allow the Absolute's influence to remain in the proximity to the Prism, even if the standard Mindflayer brainwashing would fail.

Of course, this is predicated on some pretty weird things. Such as not figuring that the whole alteration of "Tadpole doesn't completely eradicate the infected's entire brain" would mean that of course it would be a dumb idea to put any such person near the Prism. Surely if they know enough about illithid to make the alterations they'd know that it's likely that the tadpole would be supressed enough that the persons actual brain could take over again...

Then again, we see that It and the other Mindflayer on the ship (The one fighting Commander Fiery Greatsword) are seemingly unaffected by the Prism's proximity - Both consider you to be thralls due to having a tadpole in your brain, indicating that they haven't had their Mindflayeriness suppressed (The Mindflayer is also able to kill Commander Fiery Greatsword... Also you as well when he figures you're not a Thrall because you didn't get to the controls like he ordered so it's not like his powers are being suppressed by the Prism either)

Mephistopheles involvement is suspect... For sure the indications are that he is because of the ability for Gortash and Durge to make it out of Cania with an item of importance. But we have something similar with Shar in regards to how Ketheric and Balthazaar managed to use a ritual to bind Dame Aylin to Ketheric within Shadowfall without Shar doing anything about it. (Also, how is Orpheus' honour guard able to portal their way into and out of the Prism at will? Given it's supposed to be a prison created by those who are against Orpheus, why is it so easy for them to traverse it while the people who made it can't even find the bloody thing when it's right under their noses?)

As such, it comes across as more of a "We really didn't think these lore points through very hard" situation.

I think, the mindflayer on the bridge is not affected, because Empy is already in teh Prism and controlling it. We know, that he is able to decide, to whom he gives protection( like seen with Minsc), so I would say, that is not totally out there.
I agree, that Gortash didn't think that through or he would have at least included some non tadpoled people to help, in case, something goes wrong.

About Shar: I think, Ketheric boundAylin to his life force, when he still was Shars champion. I think, this was the reason, Balthasar couldn't enter the Shadowfell anymore by himself and had to rely on the group. But I agree, that Shar should be more upset about all that.

To me, Gotash's reason for obtaining the prism seemed to be first, controlling a potential threat to the plan and second, finding out more. I think it's Balthazar who describes him as having the mind of a scientist. As such, having knowledge of the prism must have prompted action.

As for why Gortash would have picked the Emperor to steal the prism, I can offer nothing but speculation based on my memories of BG3 and the old TSR/AD&D books. Let's take your standard mind flayer. They are being described as having some individuality, but at the same time sharing a deep connection with their elder brain. It was quite possible, though, that a standard mind flayer gets disconnected from that connection due to distance, magic or other things. These disconnected mind flayers would not revert to what they were before, but remain loyal to the elder brain and seek to return to the fold as it's their natural state of being. Mind flayers whose elder brains died, or who were excluded may have resisted attempts to bring them under the control of a foster brain, but those created by an elder brain would usually seek to return to it. The Emperor clearly states that he was changed at Moonrise Towers. While the Emperor had been free for some time, Gortash probably only saw a powerful champion for his cause and didn't expect the mind flayer to have second thoughts about it and not be 100% loyal to the grand design. In Act 3, the Emperor had to specifically extend "his" protection to Minsc, so at that time the prism did not work with a simple area effect. Maybe it did do that while it was still in Githyanki possession, but we can't tell.

Mephistopheles is stated as being Raphael's father on bg3.wiki. Therefore, Rafael's plans of ruling the hells and beyond may simply be those of his daddy who hated ruling only over the desolate cold of Cania.

That still doesn't explain why Gortash send mind flayer in the first place while knowing that they are negatively affected by the prism instead if bane cultists or zentharim forces.

I guess that was a question of available personnel. Gortash would have needed to train high-level Bane cultists who would be missing elsewhere, or potentially unreliable Zhentarim mercenaries with ulterior motives, for a highly risky mission into astral space, piloting a vessel able to navigate the hazards, and fighting Githyanki in one of their mightiest fortresses, all while trying to keep this secret from his co-conspirators who did not seem to be as knowledgeable about the prism as Gortash. The training would probably have taken weeks and months and they may not have had the luxury of so much time. At least the Sharrans were on the trail of "the weapon" as well. Mind flayers, on the other hand, would have no doubts about their loyalties to the grand design, know their way around the plane and how to fight Githyanki.

There was content cut from the game in which we were to fully return to Avernus. Not sure of the details, though.

P.S.: I'm not sure if this is contradicted somewhere in the game, but having the prism would also work as a fail-safe for Gortash in case either the Absolute, or the other chosen betray him. Given he believes that the prism has an area effect, he could keep the prism under his pillow to avoid getting dominated. Or, he could build some sort of tadpoled but loyal bodyguard, Steelwatch commandos or just upgrade the existing Steelwatch. At the price of a bunch of replaceable mind flayers led by a former rival in crime that is motive, means and opportunity.

My memory is also a bit fuzzy on whether the tadpoles Tav and the gang received were especially special tadpoles, bred for the prism bearers, or not.

I'm still sad about that. That would have been awesome and I guess,w e would have at some point run into Mephistopheles

Question to you D&D 5e gamers, are spelljamming helms still a thing, or would a nautiloid maybe require an illithid crew to pilot it properly?

Spelljamming helms still exist in 5e.

And as far as crew go... 5e actually reduces the requirements. Instead of needing a crew of 2-5 illithids to link minds to control the ship like in 2e. In 5e you only need a single pilot to control the ship (Any additional crew are purely for weapons and maintenance)

With regards to whether this pilot need to be illithid... Well, at the very least, Tav/Durge/Lae'zel/Shadowheart can all use the controls to stop the ship from crashing (By crashing it... Apparently) meaning that the most that is required is an illithid tadpole, if even that is required (We know that they normally have non-illithid slaves on the ships, meaning that some of their functions will work with regular people. Whether the controls are locked behind some illithid checking is unknown)

Thanks for the info! I remember there were ways to refit a nautiloid with standard helms in 2e, but even then, why the effort when you can grow the ship and use the extended features of series helms? I also didn't know that Shadowheart could beach the craft as well. I assumed it for my Tav, since she is Gith too, but Lae'zel was the only character with sufficient movement left. It makes sense since she was trained for the mission.

There's a dialogue option with Helsik (Act 3) about the Crown:

Helsik: I am afraid that I cannot take you back to Mephistopheles' vaults. That place is now locked tighter than Lord Mammon's coinpurse.
Helsik: Lord Gortash ("The two of you" if Dark Urge) wanted to steal something from Mephistopheles, so I punched a portal into the Archdevil's dusty vaults.
Helsik: You rascals stole the Crown of Karsus. Pissed off Mephistopheles to no end. (Dark Urge)


Probably because it doesn't work that way, the power of Orpheus needs to be actively siphoned, and the Elder Brain purposely released the control exerted on the Emperor when he obtained the prism.

The Netherbrain: Who do you think told the Chosen about the Astral Prism? Who do you think planted the knowledge of Orpheus' power, and the fear of what it could do? When the Chosen sent my thralls to retrieve the Prism - who do you think let the 'Emperor' slip its leash, knowing it would be the one to bring you to me?

After the Astral fight:

Player: How did Gortash and the other Chosen find out about the Astral Prism?
The Emperor: A very good question. One that I have been unable to answer. That Orpheus lives at all is ruinous to Vlaakith - she has done everything in her power to keep his existence a secret. That Gortash and the Chosen found out about it… this is impossible to explain. But it was important enough to them that Gortash sent me to retrieve it.
The moment I found it, I felt a change. My free will returning. I followed the feeling inside - And found Orpheus. I realised what the Prism was for - containment. While my body was within the Prism's bounds, my mind was free. I could resist the elder brain, the Chosen. Better yet, I could plan to overthrow them. All I needed to do was subdue Orpheus and find allies in the outer world. You.

Maybe the simpler explanation is that people are reading too much into what is generally a poorly written and haphazardly edited story.

Nice catch, Podarge! I didn't remember that bit about how the Emperor found Orpheus. The Morphic Pool/Upper City segment was a bit of a binge for me because I had an IRL deadline to get done with the game in July. While not trusting the Emperor, I neither believed the Netherbrain when it was rambling about how it planned all this. There was still reasonable doubt it was bluffing.

@Ranxerox A description that matches many paper & pencil adventures as well. They're designed to be mouldable, but many suffer from a lack of QA, continuity control and verisimilitude. Building a head/campaign canon from these sources is part of being a role-playing gamer and if done right also good fun.

@Tav'ith'sava the problem with comparing this to P8P adventures is that those are on some level meant to leave space for the DM. They can't encompass everything and aren't truly complete until the players (including the GM) meet it and fill it. Meanwhile BG3 is an absolute shambles of a story that never actually holds together when it's a game that doesn't have the same degree of openness to allow players to truly mold it.

As to the point of this thread, I doubt Mephistopheles was ever involved in the plot. It's possible though that Zariel had a larger place in the narrative and perhaps it's through her actions they were able to steal the prism. Like so many story beats in this game, stuff about the Hells are both weirdly prominent but at the same time frustratingly tangential.

I mean, that would be something, I could go behind too: Gortashs deal with Zariel includes her helping him with the heist on Mephistopheles. I just thought, that Mephistopheles migh tat some point make anappearance - not necessarily as an enemy, just like some of the gods or Vlaakith.

I have been trying to find the link for so long regret not bookmarking the moment I watched it, but there was a (?dev?) interview, supposedly we could potentially have revisited the hells more specifically Vlaakith's temple grounds which perhaps would have fleshed out more of the detail we are having on this topic maybe (?) never came to be beyond the stage of concepting I assume a lack of time was probably the biggest reason to it, that subject included a lot more that also didn't make it to the game for reasons such as not matching the flow of the game and lack of proper tech to have other details work practically from a gameplay perspective regarding other stuff, like something that could take place between Act 2 and Act 3 for example.

I keep getting the impression that Mephistopheles did not necessarily know about the theft, more or less having the same thoughts like what @fylimar is expressing above me, a revisit to frozen region of Meåhistopheles domain could have further developed a new story branching off of Baldur's gate 3' story regarding this subject, imagine that.